Work Text:
It’s ten after one, and the study’s light is still on.
The big desk, Bruce discovers after pulling the door open, is occupied.
“Eddie, why are you still up?”
“Preparing for tomorrow.” The redhead scribbles something down in a notebook. “Gotta have everything under control.”
Bruce steps closer to the desk, tying his bathrobe shut more securely. “What are you preparing for?”
“Everything.”
“So, if the sewers back up on your way to the grocery store?”
“Not going to the grocery store. We have enough eggs, I checked. Five times. But just in case we do run out, and I do end up going to the grocery store, and the sewers back up-“ Edward hands over his notebook. “Page fifteen.”
Bruce shifts through the pages.
“Oh. Creative. Well, I guess that’d work.”
“Of course it would,” Edward replies briskly, but Bruce can see his hand faltering as he reaches for his notebook.
“Aren’t you tired?” he tries.
Edward snatches the notebook back. “No.”
“Yes you are.”
“Brilliant, Holmes. Look, I’ll go to bed soon, okay?”
“That’s what you said last week. I found you here at two fifteen in the morning, passed out with a notebook imprint on your cheek.”
“Why were you out of bed?”
“Checking on you.”
Edward sighs, scrawls something down, and takes out his well-thumbed rhyming dictionary.
“Okay, you’re definitely tired. You almost never need that thing.” Bruce crosses his arms. “What if I carried you off to your bed right now?”
“Page twenty-one, paragraph eight.”
Careful not to ruin the pile, Bruce consults the named page.
He winces. “Eddie, that’s disgusting. You wouldn’t do that to me.”
“Then don’t carry me off.”
“What if I asked you nicely?”
“Page twenty-one, paragraph eight, addendum C.”
Bruce scans the fine print. His mouth twitches.
“Oh, you like it. Good. Saves me the trouble of having to sa-aahyhhhhh- it.” Edward yawns again, even more widely.
Bruce moves around the back of the desk.
Edward’s eyes narrow. “Hey, what are you doing?”
“Keeping you company,” Bruce replies simply. “Do you have anything in your notes about what to do if I hold you while you write?”
“See? This is why I have to stay up! I didn’t think of that!”
Bruce lifts the smaller man easily out of his seat. “Too late.”
“No, wait! I have to think of a riddle for this!”
“What’ll happen if you don’t?”
“Bruce!”
“You can still write,” Bruce reassures, sitting down in the newly-vacated chair and plopping Edward onto his lap.
“This isn’t funny!” Edward says desperately.
“Never said it was. Go ahead and write.”
As Bruce fully expected, Eddie’s out like a light within five minutes.
So much for preparing for everything.